Does the state of diabetes impair your sleep, or does short sleep impair your body’s ability to regulate blood sugar, thereby causing diabetes? To answer this question, scientists had to conduct carefully controlled experiments with healthy adults who had no existing signs of diabetes or issues with blood sugar. In the first of these studies, participants were limited to sleeping four hours a night for just six nights. By the end of that week, these (formerly healthy) participants were 40 percent less effective at absorbing a standard dose of glucose, compared to when they were fully rested.
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